Lemon Gem marigolds in garden

CURE ALL OR SNAKE OIL?

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Many Uses for Marigold

Gardeners who visit here frequently comment, upon seeing marigold plants growing in and at the foot of my vegetable beds, that I must have planted them for pest control. After all, marigolds are supposed to be one of the workhorses of biological pest control. Plant them and plant pests will be killed or — if they are lucky — merely repelled.Lemon Gem marigolds in garden

It’s an appealing concept: sunny plants that thwart pestilence and blight even as they brighten the garden with their blossoms. Marigolds greatest claim to pest control fame is their effect on nematodes, an effect documented in numerous scientific studies. Read more

Painting of "Man with a Hoe" Millet (1860)

HOE, HOE, HOE

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“Cultivate”??

If I told you that I was stepping outside to “cultivate” my tomatoes, you’d perhaps think I was going out to pull off suckers and tie stems to their stakes. If I told you I was stepping outside to “cultivate” my garden, you’d perhaps imagine that I was going to attend to my tomatoes, perhaps also thin out excess corn plants, prune back my early blooming clematis, and . . . you get the picture. I’m going to take care of miscellaneous things in my garden.tomato pruning & tying

I wouldn’t say I’m stepping outside to “cultivate” my meadow because a meadow doesn’t involve the intimate care needed by a vegetable, a flower garden, or fruit trees or shrubs.

But “cultivate,” when it comes to gardening, is rife with meanings. Read more

Watering can, green Haws

RAINY WEATHER: WHY WATER?

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Prognastication, Nope

Who can predict the weather? If it happens to be raining cats and dogs as you read this, my words might make you want to pelt me with ripe tomatoes — if you had them yet. Still, I’ll say it again: Timely watering is the way too get the best plant growth from any plot of ground in any season.

Watering usually helps even in wet seasons because all the water that falls in such seasons is not available to plants. Roots need air to function, and a cat and dog rain temporarily drives all the air out of the ground. Roots start to breathe and function well again only after gravity has pulled excess water deeper into the ground. A timely watering will spur plant growth in drier periods between rains.Watering form watering can

I’m not making a case for setting up elaborate irrigation systems to water every maple, marigold, lettuce, and lawngrass. (My blueberry bushes and my vegetables are the only plants that are watered regularly, here — as described in my book Weedless Gardening — with drip irrigation on a timer.) Read more

Corn ready for planting

HAVE FAITH, WITH RESERVATIONS

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Sprouts for Your Vegetables

Planting a seed is an act of faith. After all, what could seem more far-fetched than dropping a shrivelled, apparently lifeless speck of something into a hole in the ground, then expecting to return and find growing there a lush, green plant brimming with life. A lack of faith — or maybe it’s just impatience — is what drives some gardeners to set out transplants rather than sow seeds. Of course, plants such as tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants won’t ripen their fruits in due time if seeded outdoors when the soil is warm enough for germination.View of vegetable garden in mid-June

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Mountain view in garden

MAY I BORROW YOUR LANDSCAPE?

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No Work Garden Expansion

If you’re feeling that your garden or yard is too small, you can expand your horizons without buying another square inch of property, without even much work. Just borrow some landscape.

“Borrowed landscape” originally appeared in the 17th century Chinese garden treatise  Yuanye; the technique was borrowed by the Japanese and shakkei, as borrowed landscape is known, has been frquently used in their gardens. But it can be employed in any garden style.

The idea is to incorporate some elements of the surrounding landscape into your landscape to create the feeling of greater space within your garden. You could reap a feeling of infinite space if that distant element is a mountain or ocean that stretches all the way out to the horizon. Mountain view in garden Read more

Lilac before its annual pruning

MORE PRUNING?

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Showtime Again, Next Year

The main show is over, at least here on the farmden: Spring blooming shrubs and vines have strutted their stuff. With blossoms past, those plants are melding into other landscape greenery. You can’t turn your back on them, though; pruning now will encourage them into repeat performances next year and in years to come.

Many shrubs and vines renew themselves each year by sending up new stems at or near ground level. With age, these stems crowd each other, flower less profusely, and put fragrant or colorful blossoms beyond where they can best be seen or reached with your nose should you want to get close for an aromatic sniff as you walk past.

Lilac before its annual pruning

Lilac before its annual pruning

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Garlic mustard leaf

MY BRIEF AFFAIR

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What Could Be Bad?

Like most brief affairs, this one ended without rancor. A friend had introduced me to garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata), our meeting coming at a time when I could look fondly upon any wild edible plant. That was many years ago, yet after a few years tensions between us escalated. 

In retrospect, I can’t really understand the attraction I had for garlic mustard. True, the name was appealing: you would think that any plant combining the flavors of garlic and mustard would have elicited affection that would linger, even grow, over the years.Despite the enticing name, I can now reminisce with a clear mind and remember finding the taste ho-hum at best, biting at worst.Garlic mustard

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All from a seed like this sprouting one

I PLANTED MY FIRST SEED

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My Plant Stalled

Growing tomato plants from seed is fun, interesting, and, of course, useful. Perhaps even more fun and interesting is growing a tree from seed. And then you also get a perspective in a potentially long span of time, and a chance to reflect on your place in that spectrum.

I planted my first tree seed many, many years ago, when I had just dipped my toes into the wide ocean of gardening. I was living in a small apartment and, having just finished eating a McIntosh apple, took a look at what was left. A core and seeds. I removed one seed from the core and buried it an inch deep in a 6-inch diameter flower pot, then gave it a drink and moved it to a sunny window.

Hackberry seedlings

Not my first apple seedlings, but my hackberry seedlings in 2013

To my delight, the seed actually sprouted and grew to a few inches height. My vision of an old apple tree sometime offering me bushels of fruit stalled when growth of the seedling also stalled, still at a few inches height. And stayed there. Read more

My favorite bark. Can you guess what it is?

WOOF, WOOF, BUT NOT A DOG

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More than Meets Your Eye — So Look Closely

The transition from fall to winter brings many trees and shrubs from their most ostentatious to their most subtle beauty. Like a developing photographic image, the textures and colors of various kinds of bark come slowly into view against the increasingly stark winter landscape.

If you were to choose one plant for its bark, what would it be? Paper birch (Betula papyrifera) usually comes to mind, of course. But there are so many other trees and shrubs with notable bark, some as striking as birch, others with a subtle loveliness best appreciated during a winter stroll or viewed through a window from a comfortable chair.

My favorite bark. Can you guess what it is?

My favorite bark. Can you guess what it is? Read on.

Whole books — Bark, by G. T. and A. E. Prance and Bark: A Field Guide to Trees of the Northeast, by Michael Wojtech — have even been devoted to bark. They are useful adjuncts, in addition to other features such as tree form and remnants of autumn leaves on the plant or ground nearby, to winter plant identification. Read more

Sugar maple in fall

A WONDERFULLY FIERY FALL

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The Glory of the Hudson Valley Unfolds

Here on the farmden and beyond, this growing season is exiting with perhaps the most gloriously colored fall I’ve seen in decades. Standouts right around here this year are Korean mountainash, red oak, stewartia, huckleberry, and blueberry. Even Norway maple, usually with unsightly splotches of yellow, this year have been turning a fairly attractive pure yellow before dropping.

Korean mountainash

Korean mountainash

Knowing what puts color in leaves opens up the possibility for ratcheting it up. It might even increase appreciation for the various hues. To best do that, I’m going to plagiarize . . . from my own book, The Ever Curious Gardener: Using a Little Natural Science for a Much Better Garden.

Yellow and Orange

Green is from chlorophyll, most welcome in spring and through summer, but not what interests me in fall. Chlorophyll must be continually synthesized Read more